Sir,
Your front-page story in the October 28 edition of Construction News ('Downing Street to consider tender pleas') is consistent with our clients' strategy regarding the qualification process required to get on tender lists.
There is a "raft of separate schemes" used by companies to collect fees for participation. Their business models are based around buyers being clubbed together to follow restrained processes and suppliers being forced to pay to get involved.
Our Asite directory and prequalification technology gives each buyer a unique prequalification process - we do not club them together.
We protect each buyer's competitive advantage when developing an integrated supply chain - and the management of the relationships is all done through 'self-service software'.
The suppliers get a self-service information management system with control over their own data. They benefit from data management services and management reports spanning all buyer prequalification campaigns, putting the supplier in control.
This is the market's first supply chain management system where each party in the relationship is served
It is not about the membership fees - Asite's directory does not require a fee to join and maintain a listing. It is about process improvement and integrated services.
Tony Ryan, Sales Director, Asite, London